


The Briefest Heaven

by Starlithorizon



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Post Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-03
Updated: 2013-01-03
Packaged: 2017-11-23 12:17:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/622057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starlithorizon/pseuds/Starlithorizon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being back, however briefly, is both dangerous and sweet. Necessary, certainly. But there are some risks here that could not be accounted for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Briefest Heaven

Being back in London, however briefly, is like a heaven I don't believe in. If I did believe, I certainly wouldn't end up on the other side of the Pearly Gates. These past two years ( _twenty-six months_ ) have ensured that any form of heaven is barred to me. My hands are stained burgundy, a tattoo across my palms that only I can see. The count is too much, too heavy to bear. But still, I trudge on, weary and aching.

This city is like a balm. The kindest touch to my wounds, almost as gentle as the doctor I miss so tremendously. It smooths over my sore heart and tired mind and leaves me feeling almost all right. I doubt I'll ever feel even that much again, of course.

It's dangerous to be back, but I doubt I'll be recognized. I am not Linus Sigerson, or Sherlock Holmes, or anyone in particular. A scruffy homeless man, hollow cheeks darkened with the beginnings of a beard, hair shorn, covered by a cheap hat woven with synthetic fibres. I don't have a name. Don't need one. I'm barely a face. Funny, though, how close to true this one is. Tired and hollow and without a home ( _for now_ ).

I walk the old paths, scuffed trainers fitting neatly into the steps made so long ago with fine Italian leather and an old name I've nearly forgotten. I feel a gasping emptiness at my right hand, where another pair of feet used to walk. I walk alongside a black hole now, an absence of space and time and light, a collapsed star that was once an army doctor.

And then.

Stupid, sentimental, dangerous, tracing our old routes like this. Forget the snipers and criminals on my tail ( _although let's be honest, I'm on their tail, chasing them over the edge of a hospital rooftop_ ), think of him. Of _John_. Yes, I run the most terrible risk of being seen, of a trigger being pulled and watching his splendid mind burst in a crimson explosion. But that is not my most terrible risk.

So much worse.

Approximately thirty-one feet away, leaving Tesco, shopping bag in one hand. Cane in the other. Face more heavily lined than I've ever seen it, grey slowly creeping and crawling about that sandy blond, taking over. Aging so thoroughly and obscenely.

Oh, John.

My heart, which lay forgotten in the hollow cavity of my chest for so long, gives a painful lurch at the sight. Guilt spreads through my veins, sickly and viscous. I thought I ached before.

( _My dear friend, look what I'm doing to you, I'm sorry, so, so sorry_.)

He walks back to 221B with his heavy limp, weighed down by groceries and grief. It glows blackly, a quiet cloud of ink hovering around him. His grief is all mine for the taking, to devour and swallow, an offering to a deity that fell ( _so fast_ ) ( _so hard_ ) to keep him safe.

All of that grief for me.

It isn't right.

I could take it away so easily, replace it with something else. Elation, maybe. Rage. Anything but this. It hurts too much, shatters my ribs and makes it difficult to breathe. His grief could puncture a lung. I could tell him. Run up to him, say something, anything ( _Hello, John, I've missed you so much, I'm doing this for us, for you, please_ ), wait. Watch his eyes, see the wheels turn, greased with recognition. I'd be familiar, like the last few dregs of a dream just after waking up. And then, the dawning, the understanding shining on his face like red-gold sunlight, illuminating every plane and darkening every hollow carved out by his/my grief.

My name, spoken out like a prayer, an incantation, mercy.

It would be so easy.

My mind never does anything but race and tear itself apart for a solution to a problem that doesn't exist yet. Six steps ahead. At best, I'd get punched in the face ( _worth it_ ) and he'd help me take down the rest of the web.

At worst, I'd be spotted and there would be bullets for him and grief transferred into my hands.

The stakes are too high, the risk too great.

I take a shuddering breath, close my eyes, count to three. The temptation does not pass, nor does it abate. My will, however, grows an extra level of iron.

I turn around and walk the way I came, eating my steps.

Soon.


End file.
